San Bernardino County Supervisors Chairman Gary Ovitt was apparently blindsided by the use of minors as prostitutes in his district on Ontario’s Holt Boulevard, but he vowed to take immediate action against the practice.

The problem came to light on Friday when a deputy district attorney and three Ontario police officers made a special report to judges, prosecutors, public defenders, probation officers and others at a seminar on juvenile justice at UC Riverside Extension about how pimps fly in child prostitutes as young as 12 to L.A./Ontario International Airport, putting them on city streets and in the vast truck stops nearby.

In a telephone interview on Monday, Ovitt said he knew some prostitution was going on, but that he didn’t realize its magnitude or that children were involved until he read about it in Monday’s newspaper.

His first pained statement: “I have a daughter.”

Ovitt said he would create a task force that would include law enforcement, health officials and others in county government to tackle the problem.

“We need to act and rescue these poor girls,” Ovitt said.

Ovitt renewed his promise on Tuesday at the Board of Supervisors meeting in San Bernardino.

Asked if he was still committed to the task force, Ovitt said, “We’re still interested in pursuing it.”

A reporter asked to attend the task force organization meetings but Ovitt said the first meeting would not be public. He promised that as soon as the task force is operational, he would open it to the public.

The Ontario officers – Sgt. John Duffield, Detective Rob Wightman and Officer Dave Newland – who, with Deputy District Attorney Tamara Ross, helped bring the story to public attention, have been asked by the judges and other officials at the juvenile justice seminar to conduct classes on sexual exploitation of minors for judges who hear these cases and the attorneys who prosecute them.

The Ontario Police Department has given its blessing to the project.

Sgt. Mike Caldera, an Ontario police spokesman, said the department would make the same offer to probation officers and other police departments.

“It’s only going to benefit the legal process,” Caldera said. “They won’t have to start at Square 1.”

Ontario Mayor Paul S. Leon did not return numerous calls for comment placed to the city over a two-day period.

Calls to other officials also were not returned.

A secretary at City Hall said late Tuesday that Leon was home with the flu.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Karen Bell, speaking for District Attorney Michael A. Ramos, who was out of town, said she is happy the news about child prostitution is now in the public realm.

“I’ve been talking about this for months,” said Bell, who oversees all juvenile prosecution offices in the county.

“These are children,” Bell said. “It could be anyone’s child. And it’s not just in Ontario. He (Ovitt) needs to drive down Base Line,” Bell said.

“This is not a new problem. We need to think about how this works. These are willing victims.

“We do a better job of prosecuting domestic violence, gang cases and child molestation, where the victim is too young to express clearly what happened.

“We do that. Why can’t we do this?”

Bell said that different police agencies handle the problem differently.

“They need to know how it works and what to look for,” Bell said. “Almost all of the cases are out of Ontario.

“There are none in Victorville and hardly any down here (San Bernardino).

“We are not lookin’.” she said.

One horrific story Bell told is how a pimp was working foster homes in the Inland Empire. Many children in foster care are particularly vulnerable. Some have already been sexually abused in their homes.

“There are social workers who have no idea what to look for,” Bell said.

“If you want to fish, are you going to the desert or to the lake?” she asked in explaining why foster kids are such an easy target. To a foster child, the offer of a Coach bag or iPod is a big deal.

“The pimp looks like a prince. If I were a pimp I would go after foster children,” Bell said.